Deepti Naval : Indian American actress

Deepti Naval (born 3 February 1957) is an Indian American actress who has worked in over 70 Hindi films. She has most often worked in arthouse and independent films, known as parallel cinema in India. She has also acted and directed Television serials. Apart from acting, Naval is also an artist who holds exhibitions of her photographs and paintings. She is best known for her acting in films like Chashme Baddoor (1981), Mirch Masala (1985), and more recently, Leela (2002) and Freaky Chakra (2003).

Naval started her film career by playing a supporting role in 1977 film Jallian Wala Bagh. She also did a role in Shyam Benegal's 1978 film Junoon. Later in 1980 she worked in Ek Baar Phir as the main lead actress. She is known to be a sensitive actress and was a part of the art films and light films of the 80's. Saath Saath, Chashme Buddoor and Mirch Masala are some of her films from the era. She was often cast with Farooq Shaikh. Though considered as talented as Shabana Azmi and Smita Patil she somehow did not achieve the same stature in terms of awards or memorable casts.

Once she moved out of lead roles, she portrayed character roles in mainstream Hindi films but was not satisfied with the roles she got and took a break. Of late she has made a comeback of sorts with films like Bawandar and Freaky Chakra. She starred in Sudhir Mishra's 2013 movie Inkaar opposite Arjun Rampal and Chitrangada Singh. The movie is an average grosser at the box office.

In April Naval was recognized as the 2007 Tribute Honoree of the Indian Film Festival of Los Angeles.

She is directing her first film as a director in Do Paise Ki Dhoop, Chaar Aane Ki Baarish which stars Manisha Koirala.

She published a collection of her Hindi poems in 1981, entitled 'LAMHA LAMHA'.Her another collection of poems namely "Black Wind" was published by oxford bookstore in a function on 2 nd December 2004 (The statesman,New Delhi 3rd dec 2004).

She also starred in the critically acclaimed Punjabi film Marhi Da Diva (1989).

She is back in acting with a daily soap Mukti Bandhan on Colors.